UNORef10

Excellent site to explore everything there is to know about the United States government. Photos, facts and explanations on the White House.

Labeled "Facts and Fun for all Ages." Photos and basic information about the White House, the presidents, presidential pets and fun historical facts. Main focuses: presidents and White House. Visually pleasing, easy-to-use.

This site provides information about the various branches of the U.S. government, all of the U.S. presidents, the current administration, current issues, and the White House itself. It would be a good resource for social studies or history students

The Smithsonian has webpages for students, families, and teachers. The student site has primary sources in the format of pictures and video footage. They are called IdeaLabs on this site. The IdealLab I found interesting was the Walk on the Moon. It included a video footage from the Apollo landing on the moon and President Kennedy's address to the nation.

This website organizes some of the Smithsonian Institution's vast resources into four topics for students to explore: art, science, history and people/places. There are incredible virtual tours, online interactive labs, games and activities. The site has an educator's section with lesson plans and a search feature to find resources by keyword, grade, and subject.

Explore art, science, history, and people like never before. If you teach the solar system, plate tectonics, volcanoes, or rocks and minerals the Dynamic Earth site is for you. I was so impressed being able to go online and zoom in on hundreds of different rocks, minerals, and gems. Fascinating!

This site provided a simple method called SOAP in introducing students to primary sources as well as some explicit and direct instruction examples. (S=What kind of source? O=What's the occasion? A=Who's the audience? P=What's the purpose?) Additionally, it had 10-45 minute lesson plans for implementing primary documents in topics like the Montgomery Bus Boycott and Sugar in the Modern World. It provided a variety of extra resources: children's trade books, websites, standards and skills addressed, as well as how to get students to think critically about history.

This site offers teachers and students access to archival photos, documents, letters, video segments, maps, and a timeline that starts in the early 1500's

I like the chronological organization of this website and the way authors have embedded primary sources into the text about Nebraska. I also appreciate they way the timeline focuses on "Nebraska Events and Themes" but also includes "National" and "International" events. With each event the site offers Teacher Activities with lesson plans, tools, and media to share with students.

This site has everything Nebraska. Click on the Nebraska Time line and you are taken to a more detailed timeline for that period. Then click on an event and you are taken to a page with specific resources and information. There are also lesson plans to download for grades 4, 8, and 12. It is pretty easy to navigate this site.

This site offers readers a chance to hear the voices of people the history textbooks have traditionally left out. Interviews done in the 1930's with former slaves are transcribed on this site, some with photographs of the former slave included. The transcripts are difficult to read because of dialect, racial slurs, and some troubling content. With teacher assistance, though, I think these transcripts could help students better understand life for slaves in our country's history.

This site provides first-person accounts from former slaves. I have actually used this site in American Literature to show students what slaves went through. It gives them a voice and students have really connected with the slaves' stories. Students can find lots of material about slavery, but the first-person accounts make it much more personal.

This University of Washington home page provides access to primary documents, photographs, projects related to the Native American tribes. The initial page allows you to access tribal documents and other collections by country subsections. There is a specific section on Omaha as well as documents on Wounded Knee in the Midwest link. The site accesses many university projects relating to Native Americans, including University of Arizona and University of Oklahoma, all legitimate sites. This would be a great site for social studies students in OPS schools where eighth graders learn about the Trail of Tears and other significant Native American events.

A subsearch of National Geographic. If you are looking for primary source photographs, these are beautiful. They have a direct link for downloading photos to Diigo. Many categories of photos. This particular site on rainforests would be useful to elementary school students doing research on environments, animal habitats, etc.

This site explains to kids how our government operates on their own level. The branches of government are explained, website links are included and there are games that can be played. There are great lessons that can be used for every grade.

This is an amazing site, fun for kids and perfect for all grades. As a 3rd grade teacher, I found many items on the 3-5 grade level applicable to my SS program. For example, Citizenship, Your Neighborhood and Beyond, and How Laws are Made all match my curriculum and clarify these complicated processes into simple terms. I know my kids would love to match the states game under Interactive Games.

This is a good site for information on the Federal government, and it is broken down by age levels. There are games and activities for each age level. There are also links at each age level to different government sites.

This site is a WEALTH of information on the history of the United States. It includes letters, documents, photos, audio and video that are all in the public domain (and there fore also legal to use) since they are all owned by the U.S. government. Using the search box will yield many results. My favorite search on this site is to find primary sources about the great depression. A search tip: be sure to click "gallery view" when you look at your search results. It helps you know what type of source you are looking at.

search: Oregon Trail first person accounts and maps that help to explain trails and settlements Lincoln Public - grade 4 - Social Studies * Major rivers and terrain determined trail paths and settlement sites * Motivation varied (Oregon = land, California = gold, Mormon = religious freedom)

There are some great sites at this source. Their topics run from Women's history to Native American history. There are even maps. This would be a big help for upper elementary to 12th grade.

This site is full of over 1200 history web sites. There are links to hundreds of K-12 history lesson plans, teacher guides, activities, games, quizzes, and much more.

This site draws from a number of collections (University of California Berkeley, The California Historical Society, and hosted by the Library of Congress). It includes photos, artwork, letters, diaries, and legal documents. The documents touch on the Immigration experience for people coming to the West Coast from China as well as document many of the contributions made by Chinese Immigrants.

This website for kids is develped by the U.S. Energy Information Administration. It is an award winning website with the character Energy Ant. Learn all about energy, its sources, uses, how to save energy, history with information rich timeline, calculators and tools for converting energy, measuring etc., games and activities, glossary and teacher section. Text formatted.

The U.S. Energy Information Administration provides this "Energy Kids" site. It defines energy in lots of different ways. It compares renewable and nonrenewable sources as well as potential and kinetic energy. It talks about different types of energy sources, the history of energy and even provides games and activities for kids.

This website, created by the US Dept of Energy's Information Administration, answers students' questions about energy -- from what is energy to the history of energy to saving energy. Website provides teachers with lesson plans, teacher guides, virtual field trips, energy career information. All teacher information is categorized by student age group.

NOAA has primary resource collections on the Gulf oil spill, hurricanes, El Nino, tides and sea turtles. I really like the way they feature current topics of importance in the news right now. This would be a great way to teach media literacy to our students. They also have a feature activity section called "Data in the Classroom" where students can make real world connections with real data related to El Nino, sea level, and water quality.

This site is an excellent weather website with resource collections divided into the following areas: ocean and coasts, climate, weather and atmosphere, marine life (sea turtles), freshwater (water cycle), and special topics. There data visualizations for weather events, lots of maps and charts for middle/high school students to analyze weather events, water cycle lessons, and a section with activities for teachers to bring real world data into the classroom.

This site talks about the causes of the Civil War and has letters, memoirs and diaries of people that lived through the Civil War. It would give kids a better feeling about how people felt at the time the war was going on.

This cite shares differing points of views during the civil war. This site includes letters to and from family members, soldiers, slaves, women and children. It would be interesting to compare the letters to the social studies books kids use in class.

This is and an awesome site for students who want to intern for any government job possible. There are connections to the FBI, the state department, EPA, and many more. This would be good experience for any 9-12 grade student. The teacher librarian could be a big help to a student wanting to intern with almost any government agancy.

This is going to be one database which I will go to over and over again. It has an awesome section titled Teacher Resources which looks like a very interesting place to visit often. It has a section on the 21st Century literacies. It also has a curriculum collaboration section. This will be helpful because many schools are going to a lot of cross curricular activities. It has another section about ethical researching. This is one of the things that I think students have difficulty understanding and especially internet based information. Many students think because it is on the "net" it is true. I found an awesome feature. If a school is using google apps there is support on this site for them if they are having trouble with this application. There is a blog on this site as well. The last section which I thought is really nice is the sticky note cards which are available. Be sure to check out this site; its features are great.

A richly interactive site where visitors can design and create varied genres of art. A virtual tour through the NGA has an accompanying guide in 5 languages. Extensive information on artists from all eras. Lots of activities at the teacher's site. A good instructional site. Grades 3-12.

This art site allows children to explore American Folk art, landscapes, abstract art, still life, and digital photography. Children are able to manipulate art to create their own pieces. Students can also create a tropical jungle. There are additional online resources for teachers, as well as a link to exhibits from the National Art Gallery.

This page contains several art activities for children, including interactive art programs that allow students to create portraits or still life pictures. There is a link that allows students to search for specific artists or works. This site would be a good resource for art teachers, but English teachers could also use it to find different works of art that appeal to kids and could be used for descriptive writing assignments.

This site contains actual documents from the trials in Salem Village in 1692.  I searched for this site because I once taught The Crucible and think that students would enjoy seeing the court documents that they read about in the story.

This site is joint venture between the U.S. Institute of Museum & Library Services, the Wisconsin Historical Society, and National History Day. The site offers thousands of pages detailed eyewitness accounts from a number of different groups of people. The documents record the first encounters of the Native Americans and those coming into contact with them for the first time.